A long-overdue update

I have been home for a little bit over 24 hours now, and let me just say, I really miss my city by the bay! I miss my instructors, classmates, and all of the staff at GDB! It just feels so weird to be home… Even though my class was only two weeks, it felt like I had been there for a while and it was very comfortable.
So, we graduated on Saturday. That morning we had a final class lecture on traveling with your guide dog. We also practiced the technique for going through security at the airport. They no longer went to the airport to practice this. We just practiced walking through a doorway and pretending it was a metal detector, I know kind of cheesy! Then, we quickly rehearsed the graduation ceremony and how things would work out. We then had about an hour and a half till lunch. It was an early lunch, and then we would be meeting our puppy raisers around 11:45 AM.
Larissa knocked on my door and we went down to the lobby to wait for my puppy raisers to come in. The lobby is the main room where we had most of our class lectures, and I have a specific seat that I taught Mambo to find. It is a round ottoman, that sits in front of the fireplace. So, every morning during training I would direct him towards that ottoman and give a piece of kibble when we got there. He learned to find that chair after about a day or two. Well, on Saturday we went to the couch instead of that ottoman, and he seemed very confused! LOL
A few minutes later, his puppy raiser and a few of her family members and friends in the puppy club came in. Mambo did not go crazy like a lot of puppies do when they see their raiser, he was pretty mellow, like usual. I feel kind of bad for her, I know it must be disappointing when the puppy you raised doesn’t get very excited to see you… I feel that way, when I would leave Pascal for a little bit and he wasn’t excited when I came back 🙂
Mambo’s puppy raiser, Karen is currently raising her second dog for GDB. Mambo was her first, and Pascal was also the first puppy raised by his raisers too! Karen’s current puppy is a five month old yellow lab, and he seemed very big to me! She definitely said that he is more of a handful than Mambo was 🙂
we all hung out for a while, then Karen, Mambo, and I had our pictures taken. Then we were able to chat a little bit more, before the ceremony started. I put Mambo’s harness back on him, and he went to sit with Karen. My trainer helped me get to the other side of the room, where the graduates were seated.
Luckily, they do the graduation by alphabetical order, so I didn’t have to go first, LOL. Actually, I was second to last. I was so afraid that I would get all choked up and start crying and not be able to say anything. And I was really worried as I watched my other classmates graduate, and heard their puppy raisers speak, and I was crying a little bit then. Thankfully though, I was able to keep my cool, and not cry during my speech! I knew that if I cried, so would Karen.
After the graduation, we went outside to get more pictures. We took several pictures of Mambo and some of the other puppies in training. Then, a small group of us, went to BJ’s for dinner at the nearby mall. It’s funny, because that mall is called Northgate, and there is a mall very close to me with the same name 🙂 Karen then dropped us back off at campus, and after that goodbye, I finally did cry!
In a way, I feel guilty that I live so far from my puppy raisers, knowing that it will be more difficult for them to see the dog in the future. I don’t know if that’s silly or not, or if I should feel guilty about that…
I will write more tomorrow about our flight home, and our first day back at work!